Electromigration and thermomigration behavior of flip chip solder joints in high current density packages

The electromigration and thermomigration behavior of eutectic tin-lead flip chip solder joints, subjected to currents ranging from 1.6 to 2.0 A, at ambient temperatures above 100 °C, was experimentally and numerically studied. The temperature at the chip side was monitored using both a temperature coefficient of resistance method and a thermal infrared technique. The electron wind force and thermal gradient played the dominant role in accelerated atomic migration. The atomic flux of lead due to electromigration and thermomigration was estimated for comparison. At the current crowding region, electromigration induced a more serious void accumulation as compared with thermomigration. Also, because of different thermal dissipations, a morphological variation was detected at different cross-sectional planes of the solder joint during thermomigration. © 2008 Materials Research Society.